The Jewish Community Council here criticised Negro groups which are leading a boycott of local merchants, many of them Jews. The Negro groups are protesting against the failure of Congress to vote Home Rule for residents of the nation’s capital. The Council, at the same time, reaffirmed its support of Home Rule and condemned “the actions of those who have unconscionably blocked Home Rule for more than a decade. ” The statement singled out the city’s Metropolitan Board of Trade for “opposing genuine self-government” for Washington residents, and urged the Board “to discontinue its opposition.”
Then the statement added that the Council “must disavow the present boycott program by the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee and the Free D. C. Movement.” The Council said the boycott “coerces businessmen who may have no views on Home Rule and who have no voice in the decisions of the Board of Trade, to commit themselves in favor of Home Rule, by a threat of a boycott if they do not so commit themselves. “
The Council declared such actions were “a violation” of the freedom of such merchants “to have an opinion on this subject, or to have no opinion, and an invasion of their rights of privacy. ” Moreover, the statement declared, “this kind of a program is irrelevant and ineffective so far as the achievement of Home Rule is concerned, because it is not directed against the real targets. “
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
